Mother Nature's Fury

Yesterday afternoon we got to see Mother Nature's fury up close and personal - we got smashed in a big hail storm that destroyed the roofs of everyone in our small street (of 20 homes). About 3.30 we had a few claps of thunder and then some rain. I could hit a few little bangs and went to the front verandah to see a few small hailstones. They stopped fairly quickly and then I heard what could only be described as a freight train bearing down on us and 'bam' huge hail stones started coming down. They were about the size of tennis balls and then they eased off and I thought "wow, we survived".

Not so - they came back even larger!! These were cricket ball size - average 8cm some larger some smaller but about 8cm was the average.

This time the bounced and ricochet off everything, you could hear things smashing as they hit and bounced off to hit again and again. The funny thing was there wasn't a lot but they were deadly.

Ten minutes later it was all over and the damage down. Our roof was peppered, skylights - destroyed, garage roof - destroyed, our new solar electricity panels - destroyed, entertainment area roof - destroyed, car - bonnet and back of car dented (we were lucky it was under cover. Most of the cars in the street look as if someone has attacked them with baseball bats, no windows intact and covered with huge dents.


We have a small amount of water damage inside - not sure if the cooktops survived because it was under water and I won't turn it on until an electrician has looked at it. We have no lights because water go into the wall near a switch and the wall became alive. We were a lot luckier than some in our street because although our roof was peppered we had sarking under it and it protected the inside in most places. Some people nearby have lots of water damage inside their houses and won't be able to use their kitchens, some rooms etc.

All around in the nearby streets today people are coming to terms with their losses - a house I know had the same damage as us but Mother Nature was still angry and she hit the house with lightening destroying the electricity box - shooting it off the wall of the house!

I will be cooking on the BBQ for a few days until the electrician can get here. There is so much to be repaired just in our street alone. We have had a tiler look at the roof when they moved tiles to be able to get some tarps on the roof. He said I have only a few dozens tiles that don't have cracks in them. He thinks that most of the houses in the street will need new roofs.

Mother Nature is certainly trying to tell us something - guess we just aren't listening hard enough

I leave you with just a small taste of her fury.